NOTE: Originally published in The Kansas City Kansan, this piece was the Oct. 8, 1999 offering for my weekly entertainment column, Crum on Film.

By Steve Crum

Ah, memories. Maybe it is a sign of my increasingly elder age, but remembrances of my youth become clearer the older this Crum gets. As Cousin “Pud” Crum used to say of his long marriage: It seems like only yesterday, and you know what a lousy day yesterday was. Movies occupy multiple cells in my memory banks. Permit me to share some celluloid recall.

•Seeing The Robe in 1953—This 20th Century Fox spectacular was the first Cinemascope film, a process that was the most successful innovation by movie companies in the ‘50s to lure eyes and wallets away from TV and back into theaters. 

     Then a mere lad of six, I dimly recall being taken either to either the Avenue or Electric Theater in downtown Kansas City, Kansas. This was one of the very few indoor all-Crum-Family movie going ventures. Limited by money, we usually went to an area drive-in movie. 

•Watching my hero at Lake Park Drive-in, 1950s—The only specific movie memory at this location is 1955’s Davy Crockett, King of the Wild Frontier. Dad was very disappointed. Not long into the movie, he groused, “This is the same stuff we saw on TV!” True. Disney edited three episodes of the TV series starring Fess Parker into a 90-minute programmer. Smart movie too, since the movie made an Alamo-full of cash. I loved it nonetheless, since I got to see it in color for the first time. Also, I had (at home) my official Davy Crockett mock-leather  and fringe outfit with mock-coonskin cap. Call me a mock-hero. Unfortunately, both Davy and sidekick Georgie (Buddy Ebsen) still died at the end, just like on TV. EXACTLY like on TV. 

      Incidentally, Disney had grossly misjudged the popularity of his Crockett three-parter. After killing off Davy in Part 3, Disney hurriedly produced two television prequel episodes which were also later edited and released to movie theaters. (Those two adventures focused on Mike Fink, King of the River.) Why Disney did not continue producing more Crocketts on TV (or films, for that matter) is a flabbergasting mystery. At least Fess Parker donned coonskins a few years later as Daniel Boone in a long running, non-Disney TV series. Parker is now a pudgy, white-haired winery businessman and former politician. (Update: He died at 85 in 2010.)

•Don’t forget those Lake Park Drive-In sensory details!—Mom, Dad, younger sister Becky and I would trek out to the movies equipped with freshly made popcorn and a thermos of Kool-Aid. Balancing our snacks in the back seat, my sister and I would strain to see over the tall front seats, around our parents’ heads, side-glancing the steering wheel, and through the limited front window portal. Dad always parked too angled-up at drive-ins, which made our view even more strained. No wonder we tired so quickly and fell asleep. Our little necks and backs were stressed. It was clearly chiropractic child abuse. 

      Did I mention the jammies? My most feared inevitability was having to walk with my dad to the restroom at KCK’s Lake Park Drive-in while wearing my pajamas. And that was when I was 32 years old! Just joshing. I was a grade school kid, shy and insecure even then. Maybe if my jammies would not have had those footies and the trap door in back. 

More starkly personal and overly revealing movie memories will follow in future issues. 

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